841–850 of 1001 posts
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I suspect none that actually exist or have that effect.
Honestly, it amazes me how frequently people forget that people can lie.
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Prison time for tax evasion is extremely rare in the US. Almost always the IRS just collects the penalty and moves on. The only real exceptions are either for criminals with a lot of other charges stacked up (eg mob bosses). Or a public figure making a political statement like Wesley Snipes. Not saying this is good or bad. Just saying it’s how it is. Joe Sixpack who fails to report some cash income will almost certai…
Selective enforcement is bad. The fact that the law says that you could go to prison for one year for not filing taxes on time, but that it's rarely enforced means that they should fix the law. Using it only on "bad guys" is a recipe for the government punishing people that disagrees with them.
Filing late because you made a mistake will cost you interest plus possibly a penalty relating to the amount. Tax evasion is a crime which can lead to jail time. The system will decide which one fits better based on your behavior, including how cooperative you are when they investigate it.
Just like if you hit someone in the head and they die. Maybe you will get charged with murder or maybe they will believe it is an accident. There's really no way to remove these human factors from the justice system.
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Selective enforcement is bad. The fact that the law says that you could go to prison for one year for not filing taxes on time, but that it's rarely enforced means that they should fix the law. Using it only on "bad guys" is a recipe for the government punishing people that disagrees with them.
I believe selective enforcement is a core part of policing in the US. No police agency has enough resources to go after everybody who breaks the law, so they make examples of high profile defendants to deter others.
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If you are rich enough you are eccentric and colorful.
“He's mad?" "Sort of mad. But mad with lots of money." "Ah, then he can’t be mad. I've been around; if a man has lots of money he's just eccentric.” ― Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic
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I believe selective enforcement is a core part of policing in the US. No police agency has enough resources to go after everybody who breaks the law, so they make examples of high profile defendants to deter others.
One of two things is true. Either they believe everyone should be doing 30 years (preposterous) or they know they are committing a grave injustice against someone. There is no reasonable interpretation of selective enforcement.
I met John in an Atlanta airport lounge years ago[1]. I recognized him immediately as I've always admired him, and I decided to go up to him and tell him as much. He invited me to sit down, and told him about when I was a teenager in the 90s learning about tech entrepreneurs at the time, I always thought he was pretty cool and had good ideas. I told him I respected him, and that I was sure he'd lived an incredible li…
Realise that people can be super nice to you and cruel/evil to somebody else. The serial killer living next door might be a great neighbour. That doesn’t change the facts of what he/she is.
Interestingly, a minority of people seem to be somewhat able to see through the facade. I have ADHD and a brother who's very nearly on the autism spectrum, and both of those conditions seem correlated with this ability to have an unbiased sense of a person. Perhaps it's due to the way we are slightly detached from normal social interactions, or the highly analytical way our brains function. All I know is that there are definitely times I feel this. For instance, if you look online, there are tons of relatively recent videos that have special forces types (SEALS, rangers, etc.) commenting on movie scenes or so on. The comments are always full of people talking about how they seem like such a great person, or how funny/charming/positive/etc. this person is. Meanwhile, I just come away with this feeling of being very deeply unsettled by them almost every time. Everything about their demeanor unsettles me. Now I'm in no way saying every special forces operator is a closet sociopath. But the job does attract a certain personality type, and many of the ones on these videos are the most charismatic of the whole bunch.
Back on topic, John always seemed to be to be a pretty typical narcissist to me. He did some stuff that I found to be funny in kind of a black humor sense (that video of him supposedly telling you how to uninstall McAfee antivirus), but the idea that he was a truly positive person I just totally don't see. I mean, think about it -- the OP's story involves John having the guy call his wife and tell him how great he thought John was and how great his ideas were. That's pretty typical narcissistic behavior.
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It should absolutely be discounted. There's literally no evidence suggesting he was murdered. He was about to be extradited, the US Government was well on their way to making an example of him. There was no incentive to murder him.
Also of note - suicide in the US is extremely difficult if you've been identified as someone with intention. You get checked on every 15 minutes, including at night (which can be a torture by itself)
As far as the US is concerned, you've quoted policy. I'm pretty sure that jails and prisons in the US are supposed to provide medical care, mental health care, food enough for decent health (without having maggots): There are plenty of examples of it not happening. "I didn't know they were suicidal" or "We've been short staffed, and I couldn't check on him" are easy excuses.
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An unstable personality that hates the US saying the US government would stage a suicide is much more likely to actually kill themselves than your regular run-of-the-mill evil billionaire with powerful enemies saying nothing about how they will die. I don't think Mcafee really thought things through enough to come to this conclusion.
"I'd never kill myself" is exactly what a suicidal person _would_ say.. Great post.
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Nope, we don’t add up prison time in Germany for repeating the same or related crimes over and over. On top, the 10/15 years are the maximum and barely reached. E.g. Uli Hoeneß, ex-manager of the soccer club Bayern Munich, got 3.5 years for evasion of ~30m dollar in a total of 7 counts, but could actually leave prison after sth like two years, 1.5 of which where „open jail time“, so he could go to work and only had t…
Are you holding that up as an example of a functional justice system? Because that strikes me as more dysfunctional , where people are getting preferential treatment because they're part of the German footie machine.
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Because (according to the allegations) McAfee didn't pay the tax man.
Neither do Musk, Bezos, Soros etc. They just manage to get away with it. I guess McAfee was just not rich enough and didn't have the right tax attorney.
The others all file, they just recognize very little income and make sure to recognize enough losses to cover it.